“Yesterday I was caught in the rain. I had a mild fever when I went to bed. I am not altogether certain I did wake this morning. There is a very strong possibility I might still be in bed dreaming.”
He tilted his head. “You are also peculiar. I like that.”
Kitty was even more confident she was stuck in some delirious nightmare. There was a trace of amusement in the odd warmth of his voice. Nothing was clear, and she glared at the mask obscuring the nuances of his features. She wanted to flee from the madness of this encounter, and perplexingly she wanted to stay…to converse with him, to find out why he had truly come for her, what path she needed to traverse to avoid scandal and ruin.
“Why do you wear a mask?” she asked. “The speculation of your peculiarity will be on the lips of everyone within society.”
He faltered into such complete stillness, she wondered if he breathed.
“My face is scarred,” the duke finally replied.
She had not heard that rumor or even a mention in the newspapers she’d dug up on him. And Kitty was glad there hadn’t been rabid speculation that fed his pain to the ton as fodder for gossips.
“Show me,” she whispered, mildly shocked that she would dare be so familiar and improper. What madness had overtaken her? She could not credit it. Though her reaction was unpardonable, Kitty lifted her chin, an evidently defiant gesture, and waited.
“Ah…not only are you peculiar but also daringly impudent. My interest soars, Miss Danvers, infinitely so. I wonder, is this your diabolical design?”
She sucked in a breath at that bit of provoking cynicism.
He took one step closer, and the room shrank. How did he do it?
“I thought only to look upon the features of Your Grace. It is decidedly odd to converse with you so masked, as I am ignorant of your full appearance. There was nothing else behind my request.”
The hand not gripping the cane pressed against his heart, and two fingers tapped twice. “How disappointing, truly.”
He was the peculiar one, and Kitty felt like a leaf floating on the vast waters of the ocean, being churned about in its frothy waves. The duke was a man of consequence, and she sensed the force of the crafty and intelligent personality surrounding her.
While it pained her to admit it…she was intimidated.
Every instinct warned her that it would not do to appear frightened or witless, that he would not mind that she was in possession of an unruly tongue, as her mother often lamented. Yet why should it matter that he would like her oddity? The only thing of import was that her family escaped unscathed, even if she were sacrificed upon the altar of her desperate recklessness.
“Your Grace seems to want me to have another reason for my request; I would not dare disappoint you.” She canted her head left, assessing him. “Perhaps you are not the Duke of Thornton…and a charlatan out to deceive me.”
He smiled, and her heart beat faster.
“Is that the best you can do?” He tsked, as if disappointed. “Do you really think I’m not Thornton?”
“I believe you are the duke,” she admitted. It was too preposterous to consider another scenario. Only the real duke would know she pretended.
“Why do you think I came for you?”
“Am I the only reason you are here?”
“Yes.”
Dear God. It was so odd, Kitty could not dismiss him from any part of her awareness, and she so desperately wanted to. “I…am not sure, Your Grace. You are not angry or outraged. Your intentions are elusive to me, and I dearly wish they were not.”
The hand gripping the silver-handled walking cane tightened. “Did you think it was mere rumors, wicked gossips, which I’m long used to, that pushed me with the force of a battering storm from my estate in Scotland to mingle with these vipers of society? Did you think I traveled for days and nights unceasingly to be faced with pretense from your lips, Miss Danvers?”
She stared at him helplessly, her mouth dry and alarm flipping through her belly with the speed of a racehorse at Aston. It touched his lips again—that unfathomable half smile that hinted at a secret or forces at play only he understood.
“You are different, Miss Danvers. In the cold silence of my chamber, my thoughts were consumed with meeting you. I fancifully wondered if you had bewitched me; then I wondered if I had become so desperate in my emptiness that a prick of light in the form of deception could rouse me so. Different is always good, welcome, something bright, wonderful, and exquisite from the ordinary drudgery, don’t you agree?” he asked with surprising frankness.
What was he saying? Her skin felt sensitized, and her heartbeat was impossible to control. “Your Grace…”
The hollowness in his tone as he referred to his desperate emptiness struck her forcibly. And the notion that her mad scheme had inspired him somehow was too remarkable. She was something bright…and exquisite? Her mouth went even drier.
The duke had come for something from her, and she wanted to cry her frustration, for she still could not perceive it. “What do you require of me?”